The present invention relates to a shoulder rest for a stringed instrument, and more particularly to a shoulder rest for a violin or viola.
The following discussion of related art is provided to assist the reader in understanding the advantages of the invention, and is not to be construed as an admission that this related art is prior art to this invention.
Stringed instruments, in particular violins and violas, are held when played at their body end between the musician's chin and shoulder. As, however, the distance between the head and the shoulder region of the player is as a rule larger than the thickness of the instrument, the musician can hold or clamp the instrument only in a very uncomfortable posture, so that—if it is at all possible to play the instrument—impairments of the playing quality are inevitable. To counteract this, so-called chin rests and shoulder rests were developed for violins and violas.
These shoulder rests are detachably fixed on the body of the instrument by means of a holding device, thus serving for making it more comfortable for the musician to hold the instrument. In general, a shoulder rest is fixed on a violin or the like, forming a supporting area resting on the musician's shoulder, the instrument itself being supported on a chosen level. The latter depends in particular on the structure of the body, in particular of the length of the neck, the shape of the shoulder, and the position of the violin, of the musician. Such shoulder rests are known, for example, from EP 507 994 61, U.S. Pat. No. 4,062,695, DE 100 07 834 A1, U.S. Pat. No. 7,266,284, or U.S. Pat. No. 7,488,877 B2.
The shoulder rests can be configured with a solid bottom. As a rule, however, this bottom is only inadequately shaped in accordance with the musician's shoulder and thus adapted in an individualized manner, so that usually, a certain loss of playing comfort and convenience has to be accepted. For reasons of comfort, however, the underside of the solid bottom can also be provided with a cushion which is in contact with the musician's shoulder when the instrument is played. Holding or carrying elements protruding upwards and carrying pivotable fork-shaped end pieces are fixed on the two ends of the bottom. These end pieces can be fastened on the side walls of the instrument body near the back of the body. To make it possible to fasten this type of shoulder rest firmly on the instrument, the bottom of the shoulder rest possesses a certain self-elasticity, which serves for generating a certain clamping force with which the fork-shaped end pieces grip the instrument. End pieces are known in other configurations, too, in combination with the carrier elements, most of which, however, grip the instrument with a certain clamping effect.
For a high tonal quality and great harmony with the instrument, such shoulder rests are usually made of a plastic or synthetic material, more recently, however, also of wood or based on wood, and their contour is adapted, at least approximately, in an individualized manner to the shape of the players body. In this way, it shall be achieved, among others, that the player can play the instrument in a particularly comfortable and harmonious way and without impairment of his/her concentration or attention.
A particularly individualized shape and contouring of the shoulder rest, adapted to a player's personal requirements and preferences, is, however, as a rule, not possible at all or possible only with considerable expenditure and with recourse to special resources, such as, for example, machines or the like. With such an individualized shaping, one must, furthermore, always also bear in mind that the tonal quality of the instrument should not be impaired by the mounted shoulder rest or should be impaired to an, acceptable extent only. It is exactly for the combination of these design targets that up to now, at best moderate results have been achieved.
It, would therefore be desirable and advantageous to provide an improved shoulder rest which obviates prior art shortcomings and is shaped to best suit a user in a particularly simple manner and realizable by the user himself/herself to thereby allow implementation of particularly high playing quality without adversely affecting the tonal quality of the instrument.